The repair of a damaged or broken sewer pipe may require its complete replacement. A complete replacement may be to dig out the old line and replace the entire distance between man holes, a distance of up to about 400 feet or the replacement of the section of the line where the problem occurs, a section of four feet or more, referred to herein as a point-repair. Currently a point-repair requires a back hoe to dig a pit to obtain access to the broken section, remove the section and permit a person to get into the pit to connect a new section, usually a section of polyvinylchloride (PVC) pipe, to the old line. A person must be in the pit since the present connections, such as a Femco connector or adapter, are placed on the ends of the old pipe and the new section and are clamped. These clamps are similar to the clamps used on car hoses. The clamps surround the ends of the pipes and are tighten by a screw driver. Since a connector must be placed on each end of the new section, the pit must be large enough to allow a person to make the connection at both ends of the new section. A point-repair may be the required because an old pipe has a collapsed upper wall, the joints of the old pipe separate causing a break in the line, or a service connection or a tree root causes an intrusion into the old line. Whatever the reason, the present methods of point-repair require that large pits be made to connect a new section of pipe and the sewer lines often are in the back yards of homes or in streets or parking lots of businesses.
The method and apparatus of the present invention overcome the disadvantages of the methods now used for making point-repairs.